


...I spent it in good company

by maharetr



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Drunkenness, F/F, Grief, Kissing, Sex Work, Spoilers, but I figured it was all about the processing of a death so, no actual character death in the fic obviously, post-sex, processing fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-26
Packaged: 2019-06-16 15:31:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15440145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maharetr/pseuds/maharetr
Summary: "Nahh," Beau says. "It’s – it’s not for that. It’s…" She rubs her forehead, trying to find the words.It’s what he’d do, and goddammit, that’s neither useful nor helping her composure. "Go buy something nice with it. Something fun."





	...I spent it in good company

**Author's Note:**

> So this is me processing my own grief, and trying to ease Beau's grief in turn. Processing through fic ftw!
> 
> A hundred thanks to M for the ever-detailed beta. All mistakes are my own. Title is from this cover of Parting Glass https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx0ivLC6wrQ which we've all been sobbing along to for the last two weeks, yes? Yes.

Awareness returns in stages: Beau experimentally moves her fingers and toes. Opening her eyes feels much more complicated, but she manages it. The room comes into focus comes eventually. Vorsa is beside her, head propped up on one hand, looking far more composed despite the sheen of sweat.

"How you doing?" Vorsa asks. She's smiling indulgently, brushing her fingers up and down Beau's arm. The touch is setting off fresh goosebumps – somewhere between tantalising and overstimulating.

"Cold," slurs out of Beau's traitorous, drunken mouth. 

Vorsa chuckles. "I can help with that for a bit," she says. She slides their legs together again, and drapes herself over Beau’s chest, nuzzling against Beau’s neck and the sweetly aching bites there. “Better?” Vorsa whispers, smiling.

Beau closes her eyes and sighs something approximating a word – even she’s not sure what, and Vorsa chuckles. Vorsa shifts, but it’s not fun-times moving; she’s attempting to untangle the mess they made of the bedclothes. Vorsa shifts off Beau entirely, replacing her warmth with the blankets, and Beau manages a dissenting noise.

“I know,” Vorsa says, a wry smile in her voice.

Beau opens her eyes again and concentrates on focusing. Vorsa’s getting dressed, such as it is, and it’s wildly unfair that Vorsa is that coordinated while Beau can barely sit up. Beau hauls herself together and gets herself upright against the headboard.

“You gotta go, don’t you?” Beau says.

“Yeah,” Vorsa says. “Duty calls. I’m sorry.” She leans in for another kiss, though, and Beau savors the press of Vorsa’s lips. It’s not fair of Beau to sulk – she’d booked an hour, she’d _wanted_ to be left alone, after. Past-Beau was an idiot.

Vorsa is straightening up, and Beau reaches out and grabs Vorsa’s wrist in a reflex that leaves both of them blinking in surprise. Vorsa doesn’t pull away, but her eyebrows arch quizzically. Beau doesn’t have words for it, either, except that something feels _wrong_. She fumbles mentally, and then physically, not sure what she’s looking for. She pats for the nightstand, and hits a coin pouch that isn’t hers.

Beau doesn’t look down, doesn’t count how much she’s taking from the purse.

"Here," Beau insists, and drops coins into Vorsa's upturned hand.

Vorsa glances between Beau and the gift. "You already paid downstairs," she says, but it’s a careful questioning, and she’s not trying to pass the coins back.

"Nahh," Beau says. "It’s – it’s not for that. It’s…" She rubs her forehead, trying to find the words. _It’s what he’d do_ , and goddammit, that’s neither useful nor helping her composure. "Go buy something nice with it. Something fun." Then thinking-Beau starts catching up with drunk-Beau.  
_Shit, wait._ "It won’t get you in trouble, will it?"

A real smile blossoms over Vorsa’s face, crinkling the corners of her eyes. "Only if they find out," Vorsa says. She vanishes the coins into her robe.

"Okay," Beau says. "Cool. Um." _Smooth, Beauregard_ she thinks, but ploughs on regardless. "Thanks. That was good times."

Vorsa chuckles. "Yeah, it was," she says. "Call for me again, if you want, if you’re going to be in town for a while."

Beau doesn’t want to be in Shady Creek Run at all, but if she _has_ to be, another night of this would be fair compensation. She tries to sit up properly. It feels rude to still be sprawled in bed.

"It’s okay," Vorsa says, the ghost of that smile still on her lips. "I can see myself out. Sleep well."

Beau flops gratefully back into the pillows. "Thanks. Uh, you too."

Vorsa closes the door quietly behind her, leaving Beau alone in the silence, and that’s the last fucking thing she wants right now.

She wants… she wants him to be _here_ , even if it's just to flop down beside her, take up most of the bed, and to tell her to go the fuck to sleep.

" _You_ go the fuck to sleep," she mutters into the silence, and that _hurts_ breathtakingly badly. She misses Jester, and Yasha, and even Fjord, their absence a painful miasma of worry and guilt in the days since they were taken, but this is a whole new world of agonizing loss. "You fucking _idiot_ ," she chokes, to Molly and herself both. "You fucking _stupid_ \--" The first sob forces its way out of her throat, and then she’s crying, really crying, hard enough that she’s distantly glad of the private room.

Grief drags her under, and there’s no way to fight it, no way to even keep her head above the surface, there’s just riding it out and hoping she doesn’t drown. 

She's been stabbed in the guts before and that had hurt less than this. Not only that, there’d been something she could _do_ about that one – she'd wrenched the knife out, stabbed him back, and staggered off to find a healer willing to work for a lot of coin and ask no questions.

This particular stupidity they have the coin for – they just need to find someone willing to sell them the diamonds. Finding a skilled enough cleric somewhere in this shithole is going to be the challenge, and that's before they tackle the challenge of how to convince the particular tribe leader to let their cleric do outside work. Bribery is going to be the best bet, if they have enough money left over. Or intimidation. She’s not at all above that, should it come to it. 

_That’s not leaving a place better than you found it._ it’s Molly’s voice in her head. Of course it is.

"Like I care," she mutters. She does, though. Because the odds of getting him back are low. _So_ low. Because she’s heard the stories of the failed rituals: the bodies that stayed still and cold, the souls that were long gone within the first few hours or days. And if Molly himself was to be believed, he'd come back once already. Came back _empty_ before. Would he even want to come back again?

"If you want to," she croaks, "I'll find you that door, I swear. But if you don't..."

She presses the heels of her hands against her eyes, hard, watching the swirls of blackness until she can breathe again. 

If he doesn’t want to come back, well…

Molly’s coin purse is soft and worn, and smells of leather and metal. She doesn’t know about this nature bullshit, with people living on in leaves, but coin – coin is much more her language.

"If you’re too much of a lazy bastard to come back again," she says, somewhere between a promise to him and a vow to herself, "I'll redistribute it for you, if you don't want to do it yourself. I'll make people smile with it."

There's silence in the room, and in her head. Everything still hurts. This wound is going to damn well take its time closing, she know that. But she's got something to do, while it's doing that.

She draws her knees up to her chest under the covers in a way she hadn’t done since she was a little kid. "Fuck you for making me care," she whispers. 

_Fuck you, too_. Molly is chuckling in her head, and her tears this time are a slow leak until the drink and the exertion finally do their job and steal her away into unconsciousness.


End file.
